The
Roberts Space Industries website offers a new
Hornet Patch which adds the Hornet Ghost, Hornet Tracker, and Super Hornet
spacecraft to the Star Citizen Hangar Module . This is accompanied by
this trailer with some pretty amazing
visuals. They
also announce that Star Citizen crowd-funding has now passed the $24 million
mark, as this return to Wing Commander-style gameplay continues to rake in
donations at a record pace. The new stretch goal this unlocked is a public
transportation system, and they outline what happens if (when?) their fundraiser
hits the $26 million mark:

Enhanced Capital Ship Systems – In addition to
the command and control systems we’ve already outlined, we’re going to expand
capital ship functions! Lead a damage control team to fight fires and repair key
systems during battle, control internal bulkheads to slow boarders and man a
number of consoles, like navigation and engineering, that will make commanding a
capital ship feel even more immersive.

InBlack wrote on Oct 25, 2013, 05:50:I love it how fanbois twist and pervert facts so that their worldview remains comfortable and unchallenged. Even AFTER Digital Anvil sold out to Microsoft, CR kept on feature creeping and missing his deadlines. After about 18 months of that MS execs finally stepped in and took him off the game. If they hadnt Freelancer would have ended as up taking as long as Duke Nukem Forever...

I responded the way I did because I knew I was being provocative [instead of blaming everything on CR like you, I blamed Digital Anvil]. Now that you've mentioned worldviews being comfortable and unchallenged, do you have a specific source/link that highlights that CR is at fault of everything here, or was it just simply convenient for you to blame him for everything? I'd rather know specifics than to take you at your word.

Many times, stories are much more complex than that. Simply blaming things on one simple cause tends to come from personal beliefs and not from the facts.

InBlack wrote on Oct 24, 2013, 03:47:I dont want to be the party pooper but Chris Roberts nearly fucked up Freelancer in the same way (actually he DID fuck up freelancer, but only up to a point). He feature crept for years until the execs at Microsoft bought out his company, took him off the project lead, fixed up what was there as best as it could be fixed and released a hodge podge mess of a game that turned out to be kind of cool but lacking in so many respects. This was one of the last times that Microsoft execs actually did something worthwhile at that company.

You're mistaken because CR did not own Digital Anvil outright. Who fucked things up? Digital Anvil. Who sold out to Microsoft against the objections of CR [and made a profit due to selling out]? Digital Anvil.

I love it how fanbois twist and pervert facts so that their worldview remains comfortable and unchallenged. Even AFTER Digital Anvil sold out to Microsoft, CR kept on feature creeping and missing his deadlines. After about 18 months of that MS execs finally stepped in and took him off the game. If they hadnt Freelancer would have ended as up taking as long as Duke Nukem Forever...

CJ_Parker wrote on Oct 24, 2013, 03:53:Chris Roberts once said that the dogfights should be about on par with WW2 war planes so it is in fact rather "slow".

Is that realistic or just how he wants it done. I would envision space fighters moving at many thousands of miles per hour if realistic.

Don't satellites move at like 15000 + MPH?

Satellites are in orbit. They have to move that quickly or they'll fall to the planet and get destroyed. If space fighters are dogfighting in wide open space, they could realistically go as slow or fast as they wanted to.

Of course, space games always show you fighters dogfighting while near a planet, which would be highly unrealistic. The amount of Delta-V they'd waste countering gravity while trying to chase each other would burn out their fuel in like 30 seconds max. (Thanks Kerbal Space Program!)

That said, the one game which tried to do realistic space dogfights (elite 2) made it an absolute fucking snore. Approach each other at combined velocities of ~ 6-10K km/s, fire at each other for approximately 1/10th of a second, shoot past each other, spend 8 minutes turning around and resetting your velocities, repeat.

If you ever got attacked by one single pirate in a tiny ass ship, with nowhere near enough firepower to even make your shield blip to 99%, you were in for a fucking terrible time, as it would take you hours to try to shoot the fucking thing down, and it being there "attacking" you meant you couldn't engage time compression. (I once got attacked by a guy in a single fighter while I was flying a Panther Clipper with literally 400 meters of shields. And he kept going "I'm going to kill you!" Motherfucker, I'm flying the equivalent of a fucking CONTINENT here, and you're standing there with a squirt gun!)

God, fighting in that game was pure, utter MISERY. They need to stay far far far far far far FAAAAARRRRRR away from that kind of shit.

I thank you for your misery, though, because this post really made me smile. It sounds horrible, but makes for some entertaining stories.

InBlack wrote on Oct 24, 2013, 03:47:I dont want to be the party pooper but Chris Roberts nearly fucked up Freelancer in the same way (actually he DID fuck up freelancer, but only up to a point). He feature crept for years until the execs at Microsoft bought out his company, took him off the project lead, fixed up what was there as best as it could be fixed and released a hodge podge mess of a game that turned out to be kind of cool but lacking in so many respects. This was one of the last times that Microsoft execs actually did something worthwhile at that company.

You're mistaken because CR did not own Digital Anvil outright. Who fucked things up? Digital Anvil. Who sold out to Microsoft against the objections of CR [and made a profit due to selling out]? Digital Anvil.

CJ_Parker wrote on Oct 24, 2013, 03:53:Chris Roberts once said that the dogfights should be about on par with WW2 war planes so it is in fact rather "slow".

Is that realistic or just how he wants it done. I would envision space fighters moving at many thousands of miles per hour if realistic.

Don't satellites move at like 15000 + MPH?

Satellites are in orbit. They have to move that quickly or they'll fall to the planet and get destroyed. If space fighters are dogfighting in wide open space, they could realistically go as slow or fast as they wanted to.

Of course, space games always show you fighters dogfighting while near a planet, which would be highly unrealistic. The amount of Delta-V they'd waste countering gravity while trying to chase each other would burn out their fuel in like 30 seconds max. (Thanks Kerbal Space Program!)

That said, the one game which tried to do realistic space dogfights (elite 2) made it an absolute fucking snore. Approach each other at combined velocities of ~ 6-10K km/s, fire at each other for approximately 1/10th of a second, shoot past each other, spend 8 minutes turning around and resetting your velocities, repeat.

If you ever got attacked by one single pirate in a tiny ass ship, with nowhere near enough firepower to even make your shield blip to 99%, you were in for a fucking terrible time, as it would take you hours to try to shoot the fucking thing down, and it being there "attacking" you meant you couldn't engage time compression. (I once got attacked by a guy in a single fighter while I was flying a Panther Clipper with literally 400 meters of shields. And he kept going "I'm going to kill you!" Motherfucker, I'm flying the equivalent of a fucking CONTINENT here, and you're standing there with a squirt gun!)

God, fighting in that game was pure, utter MISERY. They need to stay far far far far far far FAAAAARRRRRR away from that kind of shit.

The key is to run a kickstarter. Every time more funds are added, post it on sites like Blue's News. This will create a bandwagon effect of getting more dollars. Rinse, repeat. It's free advertising and a money making machine!

Creston wrote on Oct 23, 2013, 11:36:Excuse me, there's a little string of drool hanging from my lip that I have to clean up.

Can the final game really look this incredible, and have anything near a playable frame rate? I sure hope so.

One important development aspect to keep in mind is that this is NOT a cross-platform title. So, there's no restriction on what they can do, like there might be with something like a GTA V port. So they can bump up the particles, physics, polys, and textures much more so than if they had that restriction.

Yes, they've stated this is a 4k-optimized game. They are pushing the future of graphics here--excellent. While others go backwards into the ubiquitous mediocrity of consoles, portable cell phones and tablets, guys like these are pushing ahead. It's because of people like this that one day 4k will be affordable for most everyone who wants it.

So far they've raised a bit more than half of what Valve blew through several years ago making HL2. Big deal. I'm hoping this will have a decent single-player component, however.

It is well known that I do not make mistakes--so if you should happen across a mistake in anything I have written, be assured that I did not write it!

bigspender wrote on Oct 23, 2013, 18:31:the visuals are great no arguments there - but please tell it won't be that slow?

This ain't an arcade space shoot'em up but a space sim, dude. Chris Roberts once said that the dogfights should be about on par with WW2 war planes so it is in fact rather "slow". It should make combat infinitely more interesting though when you actually have to use advanced tactics and all of your ship's combat capabilities in order to win a fight.

I dont want to be the party pooper but Chris Roberts nearly fucked up Freelancer in the same way (actually he DID fuck up freelancer, but only up to a point). He feature crept for years until the execs at Microsoft bought out his company, took him off the project lead, fixed up what was there as best as it could be fixed and released a hodge podge mess of a game that turned out to be kind of cool but lacking in so many respects. This was one of the last times that Microsoft execs actually did something worthwhile at that company.

This has already proven the big boys wrong as many of us knew all along this genre was never dead and always should have had at least a single entry released semi-annually. This is also a miss for many other developers who could've but didn't see it.